Tuesday, a United States astronaut and a Russian cosmonaut completed a five and a half hours spacewalk outside NASA’s International Space Station (ISS), during which they installed a probe to monitor conditions around the outpost.

NASA engineers reckon that the main reasons behind the off-course landings of Russian space capsules that were heading back from the ISS in October 2007 and April 2008 were some electrical charges that gave rise to the issues leading to the ballistic landings.

In order to keep a close eye on the electrical fields near the place where Soyuz capsules dock the ISS, on Monday, Russian flight controllers assigned station commander Michael Fincke and flight engineer Yury Lonchakov to perform a spacewalk aimed at installing the monitoring device.

For Lonchakov, the mission accounted for his first spacewalk, while Fincke is a veteran in the matter, having went on four spacewalks before this week’s one.

The astronauts also installed two science experiments on the outside of the ISS’s module, but unfortunately, the latter could not be tested, since no data coming from them managed to reach the ground.

The International Space Station is a $100 billion project developed via the joint efforts of 16 nations, which is approaching its completion date after 10 years of having been under construction.

For the following year, NASA has planned to expand the ISS’s living quarters so as to make it capable of hosting six residents instead of three, while the space agency’s next mission to the station has been scheduled for February.